Cypresses was painted in late June 1889, shortly after Van Gogh began his yearlong stay at the asylum in Saint-Rémy. The subject, which he found "beautiful as regards lines and proportions, like an Egyptian obelisk," both captivated and challenged the artist: "It’s the dark patch in a sun-drenched landscape, but it’s one of the most interesting dark notes, the most difficult to hit off exactly that I can imagine." One of two close-up views of the "very tall and massive" trees in a vertical format (the other is in the Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo), Cypresses was shown in the 1890 Salon des Indépendants.

Vincent van Gogh. Letter to his brother Theo. [June 25, 1889] [Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam, inv. no. b644 V/1962; pub. in Van Gogh Letters 1958, letter no. 596; Van Gogh Letters 2009, letter no. 783], discusses two studies of cypresses that he has been working on and includes a sketch of this painting in the letter (JH1750), stating that he believes it will turn out to be the better of the two, and adding that he will send a further drawing of the painting.

Lucien Moline. Letter to Johanna van Gogh-Bonger. June 14, 1895 [Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam], states that he has found a dealer who will purchase this painting along with six others for a total price of Fr 800, not counting the cost of the frames and his own commission.

Julien Leclercq. Letter to Johanna van Gogh-Bonger. February 20, 1901 [Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam], states that he purchased this painting eight days ago for Fr 600.

J.-B. de La Faille. Les Faux Van Gogh. Paris, 1930, pp. 7–8, 44, pl. 6, discusses the relationship between this work, the drawing in Brooklyn (F1525), and two paintings (F614 and F616) with very similar compositions which he had exposed as fakes in the corrigenda to his catalogue raisonné of 1928.

Carl R. Baldwin The Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Impressionist Epoch. [New York], 1974, p. 20, ill., believes it should be considered the daylight counterpart to "Starry Night" (Museum of Modern Art, New York), painted at about the same time.

Marja Supinen. "Julien Leclercq-Vincent van Goghin varhainen puolustaja." Taidehistoriallisia Tutkimuksia Konsthistoriska Studier 11 (1988), pp. 82, 87–89, 92, 109, fig. 8, identifies it as having been in Leclercq's collection, and as no. 35 in the 1901 Bernheim-Jeune exhibition, at least in part because of the name "Leclercq" which appears in blue across the back of the stretcher.

Teio Meedendorp inThe Paintings of Vincent van Gogh in the Collection of the Kröller-Müller Museum. Otterlo, 2003, pp. 298–99, ill. (color), discusses the painting and its provenance in relation to a related work (F620); explains the symbolism of the cypress.

Frances Fowle. "Painting Like a Provençal: Cézanne, Van Gogh, and the Secret of Monticelli's 'Alchemy'." Soil and Stone: Impressionism, Urbanism, Environment. Aldershot, England, 2003, p. 147, calls this and F620 "possibly his [Van Gogh's] most Monticelli-like compositions;" states that our picture was the initial study.

The name "Leclercq" is written in blue across the left side of the stretcher. [see correspondence in archive file]

Van Gogh painted this picture in June 1889 at Saint-Rémy. He included a sketch of the composition in a letter of June 25 to his brother Theo. There is also a pen-and-ink drawing (F1525; Brooklyn Museum of Art) made after the painting.